“Sometimes when he’s carrying the puck up the ice, it’s almost like Malkin. The kid’s 6-foot-5, or whatever, and skates like the wind. I don’t think teams actually realize how fast he’s going until he skates by them.”
- Stars captain Jamie Benn on Valeri Nichushkin
Sidney Crosby and Joe Thornton.
Sidney Crosby dominated Canada's first game at the 2016 World Cup, just like he dominated the 2016 Stanley Cup playoffs. Is this is the best version of Sid yet?
TORONTO – I'll try to keep the hyperbole at a minimum here, but when it comes to Sidney Crosby, one of the greatest hockey players of all-time, it's difficult to avoid.
So I won't say the hockey world left Crosby for dead last December. But considering the lofty standard he's set for himself throughout his career, he experienced perhaps his own equivalent of being left for dead. He had two goals and 11 points after 20 games. He was struggling through a season so miserable he even wrote this summer about how badly he never wanted to experience that feeling again. The idea of him climbing back into the NHL scoring race and reclaiming his unofficial title of World's Best Hockey Player seemed far fetched. The sport belonged to Patrick Kane or, the year before, Carey Price. And there was nothing wrong with that. Crosby was a decade into a Hall of Fame career, he was nearing the end of his 20s, and it was possible he was merely exiting his prime a bit earlier than expected.
The Crosby-is-finished hype looks laughable now in hindsight. From the moment the Penguins fired coach Mike Johnston and promoted Mike Sullivan from their AHL affiliate, Crosby ignited. Sullivan helped free him up to play his north-south game at breakneck speed. Crosby's 66 points in 52 games over the rest of the season led the NHL. He was the league's best player in the playoffs and took home the Conn Smythe Trophy as second-season MVP. His days of lapping the scoring field with 120-point seasons were over, but the new Crosby was an evolved version, dominant in every aspect of the game, from faceoffs to lower-body strength to puck protection to advanced statistics to his good, ole-fashioned laser of a backhander. Like Steve Yzerman midway through his career, Crosby enjoyed a renaissance of sorts as a more complete specimen.
After watching Crosby skate circles around the Czechs in Canada's first round-robin game at the World Cup Saturday, it's time to wonder if Crosby, already the best player of this generation, is getting better. His chemistry with linemates Patrice Bergeron and Brad Marchand is excellent. He showed a sixth sense when he fed Joe Thornton all alone in the slot for Canada's fourth goal. He looked flawless out there.
"I think he's always been the best player in the world," said defenseman Brent Burns, Crosby's Stanley Cup final foe with the San Jose Sharks, now his teammate with Canada. "What makes him that is he works every day at it. He's always striving to get better, to be the best and stay up on that plateau, I think there are a lot of guys chasing him, and that pushes him to get better."
Now's the time when angry Flyers fans, er, blog commenters, strike back against the so-called insufferable Crosby love. But to do so at this point is to merely be a contrarian, to be a hater of greatness. Instead of fighting it, just stop and appreciate it. It wasn't hyperbolic to praise Wayne Gretzky's brilliance, nor Bobby Orr's, nor Mario Lemieux's, nor Patrick Roy's. And Crosby is approaching a similar stratosphere. He has two scoring titles, two MVPs, two Stanley Cups, a Rocket Richard, two Olympic gold medals, two Olympic game-winning goals, a World Championship and the highest points per game of any NHLer in history not named Gretzky, Orr, Lemieux or Bossy. If he keeps playing like he did to open the World Cup, he'll add one more impressive team trophy to the case. Canada coach Mike Babcock isn't yet ready to concede that Crosby has reached a new level, though.
"Let's not get carried way," Babcock said. "He was the star in Sochi. He was the star in Vancouver. What you saw tonight, though, is he got the points. Everyone likes to get points, Sid likes to get points, too, but it took the team to win, and he was the leader. Were in the process here, and as the team gets better, he has to get better. But it was a good start for his line."
And maybe why Crosby keeps improving is because he adopts that same mindset. He's never satisfied. Neither were any of the sport's all-time greats.
"There are still things we can improve on, but to get rewarded for our hard work, and get a couple on the power play, and get some big kills early on, all those little things go a long way," he told reporters after the game.
And that line is Crosby in a nutshell, isn't it? The man accomplishing the big things on the big stage is the one obsessed with the little things.
Matt Larkin is a writer and editor at The Hockey News and a regular contributor to the thn.com Post-To-Post blog. For more great profiles, news and views from the world of hockey, subscribe to The Hockey News magazine. Follow Matt Larkin on Twitter at @THNMattLarkin
Sidney Crosby has won 22 straight and his only concern is making it 23...Swedes must be smarter...Carey Price on beer league hockey.
Team Canada captain Sidney Crosby is on something of a roll lately. Not only did he win his second Stanley Cup in the spring, he enters the World Cup of Hockey semifinal riding a 22-game winning streak in a Canadian uniform dating back to the Vancouver Olympics in 2010.
Since losing 5-3 to USA in the last game of the preliminary round, Canada won the next four games en route to the gold medal. Crosby’s teams then went 6-0-0 in Sochi and 9-0-0 in games in which he played in the 2015 World Championship before going 3-0-0 in the World Cup. Crosby has nine goals and 20 points in those games, including the golden goal in overtime in Vancouver and a goal in the 3-0 win in the gold medal game in Sochi.
“I didn’t even know about that until today,” Crosby said. “Those don’t really matter going into tomorrow, right? It’s all about tomorrow right now.”
SWEDES CAN’T PLAY ‘STUPID’
Swedish defenseman Oliver Ekman-Larsson said his team can’t afford a repeat of its play in the final pre-tournament game when it lost 6-2 to Team Europe, the same team it plays in the semifinal Sunday afternoon. “We played a really stupid game,” Ekman-Larsson said. “We turned over too many pucks at their blueline, at our blueline, all over the ice. When you do that against a team with that much skill, you’re in big trouble.”
Team Europe coach Ralph Kruger said that late in that game, Frans Nielsen pointed to the Danish shoulder patch flag and reckoned he had lost to the Swedes about 200 times during his career. He then said how happy he was to finally beat them. The Swedes know they’ll be playing an opponent motivated by a desire to knock off one of the world’s hockey powers.
“I said right from the beginning I thought it would be great for the guys on Team Europe to have a chance to beat some of these teams,” said Swedish defenseman Erik Karlsson. “Good for them. I wish then all the best, except for on Sunday.”
CAREY PRICE HAVING SOME FUN
During his media scrum yesterday, Canadian goalie Carey Price seemed a little perplexed by a question from Marc-Andre Perreault of TVA Sports in Quebec. Perreault asked Price why Canada always comes into these big games saying it’s just another game when clearly there is so much on the line.
“Because that’s what it is,” Price said. What followed was this rather interesting exchange:
Perreault: “But in my beer league, when we play Maggie’s Corner Store, we get all excited.”
Price: “I don’t know. Maggie’s Corner Store must be pretty good, huh?”
CANADA, TEAM EUROPE WILL KEEP IT PREDICTABLE
Exciting hockey doesn’t always win, but boring hockey almost never loses. And that’s why Team Canada and Team Europe will continue to play predictable hockey for the rest of the tournament.
“I don’t like to feed my family on hope. I like to feed my family on know,” said Team Canada coach Mike Babcock. “I don’t like surprises, not on Christmas, not on my birthday. So I don’t want it anymore. I want it under control.”
Team Europe, meanwhile, won’t be in the mood to trade chances, either. “We’re playing a boring style of hockey, but it’s proving to be a successful one,” said Team Europe captain Anze Kopitar. “We’re proud of it and we’re going to keep doing it.”
BUT TEAM EUROPE WILL BE FAST
If there was one thing we learned about Team Sweden from its game against North America it was that the Swedes had all sorts of trouble handling the speed of the under-24 team. Team Europe is considerably older, but coach Ralph Kruger is keenly aware that it will have move quickly in order to win.
“There’s no question that we really need to be a strong transition team,” Kruger said. “We’ve created a lot of offense out of that. And (Sweden) is probably the best in the world at just defending and staying within their structure right through an entire game. We need to be patient with that. I’m expecting a one-goal game and we need to find our advantage like we did against the Czechs. It will be a similar game at a higher level and we’re going to have to pick it up."
Pekka Rinne.
Which players will cost a pretty penny at the draft table and burn you with subpar production relative to expectations? Matt Larkin identifies 10 to avoid.
Picking sleepers is one of the most exciting aspects of fantasy hockey drafts. It makes us look smart. That's why I've offered up my favorite 10 for 2016-17 here. But as much as we like to think finding those late-round gems puts us over the top to win championships, something else matters much more: avoiding mistakes in the early to mid rounds.
And a "mistake" doesn't always mean picking a bust player who has a terrible season or gets injured. It can also mean taking a perfectly decent player way too early when many more effective guys are still available. I define overvalued fantasy picks as some combination of:
So here are my top 10 players to avoid in 2016-17 based on Yahoo average draft position (ADP) compared to my top 200 rankings, listed alphabetically. And remember, I'm not saying these players are bad…only that they are being drafted too early.
Justin Abdelkader (THN rank: none: Yahoo ADP: 161.6)
We have a bunch of Dean Lombardis at the fantasy draft table, apparently. It's no disrespect to Abdelkader, a scrappy and useful winger who can play on any line, but he's not a high-end scorer. He's 29, and his career highs in goals and points are 23 and 44, respectively. He's not getting any better than this. Even though he gets a boost in penalty minutes leagues, it's laughable to see him being drafted ahead of William Nylander, Sam Reinhart and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins in typical leagues.
Sergei Bobrovsky (THN rank: 200; Yahoo ADP: 139.2)
Some poolies cling to the idea of 'Bob' as a Vezina Trophy-winning world beater. He's a talented goaltender…when he plays. The soft-tissue injuries have become a yearly headache. Instead of taking on the Bobrovsky problem, why not grab the dirt-cheap and durable Cam Talbot, who goes 17 picks later on average?
Matt Murray (THN rank: 144; Yahoo ADP: 69.7)
This one stings, as I'm a huge Matt Murray backer. Have been for years, so much that I'm teased for my man-crush in the THN office. Listing Murray here has nothing to do with his talent, which is immense. It has everything to do with Marc-Andre Fleury. Murray is likely locked in a timeshare at best until Penguins GM Jim Rutherford trades Fleury, and no deal is imminent. Murray's Stanley Cup heroics have inflated his ranking to the point he's being drafted ahead of actual starters like Brian Elliott and Semyon Varlamov. That shouldn't be happening. It's a different story in keeper leagues, of course.
James Neal (THN rank: 116; Yahoo ADP: 37.7)
James Neal, top-40 fantasy player? Sheesh, that's steep. He's currently valued as if he's still ripping off 40-goal seasons like he did in his Pittsburgh days. Neal's fresh off a highly useful effort of 31 goals, 58 points and 65 penalty minutes. But it's just plain strange to see him picked in the fourth round on average, ahead of Blake Wheeler, the league's No. 6 scorer, and Jack Eichel, whose floor might be Neal's ceiling. Get a grip, drafters.
Jonathan Quick (THN rank: 53: Yahoo ADP: 18.6)
Quick's legendary playoff prowess puffs up his fantasy value every season. I concede he's valuable in pools weighting wins heavily, but he's finished 34th, 22nd, 17th and 19th in save percentage over his past four seasons. His rate stats are merely average. It's thus odd to see Quick the fourth goalie off the board, before Cory Schneider, Corey Crawford and Henrik Lundqvist.
Pekka Rinne (THN rank: 122; Yahoo ADP: 34.6)
Rinne is one of the most athletic goaltenders in the NHL, blessed with a lightning-quick glove hand, honed by playing a form of Finnish baseball. He's a fun guy to interview. Other goaltenders I've spoken to consider Rinne one of the best in the business. But it's harder every year to justify that status. The numbers just don't support it. Rinne has posted a save percentage of .910 or lower three times in his past four seasons, he turns 34 in November, and he's become the analytics crowd's whipping boy. Apparently, the stats get ugly if you look under the hood, as our guru Dom Luszczyszyn did last season. Like Quick, however, Rinne will still get enough starts to carry substantial worth in leagues that focus on volume stats like wins and shutouts. He's quite overvalued in rate-stat leagues, though.
Patrick Sharp (THN rank: 173: Yahoo ADP: 79.5)
Sharp going in the middle of the sixth round? Huh? He scored 34 goals in 82 games with the Chicago Blackhawks in 2013-14. Since then he has 36 goals in 144 games. There's no shame in it, as Sharp is simply in decline at 34, but he's now just a safe depth guy you grab in the late middle rounds to fill out your roster. He's still being drafted as a core player, ahead of Brandon Saad, Jonathan Huberdeau, Andrew Ladd, Tyler Toffoli, Jordan Eberle and Jakub Voracek. I don't know who the poolies are making these shameful picks, but I want in their leagues and I want to play them for money.
Andrew Shaw (THN rank: none; Yahoo ADP: 147.6)
Shaw, like Abdelkader, is admired in real life for his versatility and tenacity. But just because you're a fun player to own doesn't mean you're a good player to own in all but the deepest of leagues. Shaw will top out at 15 to 20 goals and 35 to 40 points. He should be on waiver wires in most pools.
Alexander Steen (THN rank: 110: Yahoo ADP: 77.9)
Steen is a productive player, one of the more underappreciated of his generation. He's typically been a great sneaky add around pick 100, but things have reversed. Now he's overvalued at 77.9 because he never gets through a full season. He's missed 12.3 games on average over his past three years. Major shoulder surgery in June knocked him out of the World Cup, and while he's optimistic about suiting up for the Blues next month, it's concerning that his health is already in question again.
Jimmy Vesey (THN rank: none; Yahoo ADP: 124.6)
Jimmy Vesey is being drafted ahead of Auston Matthews right now. There are no words. Matthews lit up a pro league in Switzerland, then flourished against NHLers at the worlds, and now he looks poised to make a statement with Team North America at the World Cup. Vesey won the Hobey Baker as college hockey's best player but has never played pro hockey. He should have a learning curve and is nowhere near a lock to make the Rangers. The hype train has veered off the rails and tumbled into a ditch.
Chicago's and Los Angeles' "mini dynasty years" have inflated the ADPs of everything they touch, from current players to former players. They're all great real-life contributors, but they're presumed to be top-notch fantasy assets, which they aren't. I mentioned Quick, Sharp and Shaw already, but here are some more overpriced current and former Hawks and Kings:
Computer glitches, faceless monsters and/or the players' own families drafting them would be the only plausible explanations for these downright zany ADPs:
Matt Larkin is a writer and editor at The Hockey News and a regular contributor to the thn.com Post-To-Post blog. For more great profiles, news and views from the world of hockey, subscribe to The Hockey News magazine. Follow Matt Larkin on Twitter at @THNMattLarkin
Brad Marchand
Canada got a scare from the Russians and trailed for the second time in the entire tournament, but Brad Marchand’s pair of goals helped put Canada ahead for good.
It was looking a little dicey for Canada for awhile. Even though the master plan was in full effect – control the play and bombard Russia with shots – netminder Sergei Bobrovsky was playing Superman in the other crease. But good things tend to happen when Canada follows the plan and eventually Bobrovsky could hold the fort no longer. In the end, Canada got the 5-3 score that reflected the imbalance on the ice and now the Canucks move on to the World Cup final.
It's actually quite incredible that Russia led the game 2-1 at one point in the second. After Sidney Crosby opened the scoring with a tremendous strip and deke in the first, Russia repaid Bobrovsky for his heroics in the second. A bad Jay Bouwmeester pinch led to a 2-on-1 and a Nikita Kucherov snipe, which was followed by Evgeny Kuznetsov cashing in on a nice charge by Ivan Telegin.
But Crosby came to Canada's rescue again, hawking another puck in the offensive zone and slinging it to a wide-open Brad Marchand, who made no mistake at the side of the net.
The dam finally broke in the third, with Marchand slipping a wrister past Bobrovsky, followed by strikes by Corey Perry and John Tavares. Canada outshot Russia brutally throughout the contest and the possession numbers were similarly one-sided, as one would presume. Despite Bobrovsky's all-world play (a quick recap: he stoned Tavares on two point-blank shots, outwaited Steven Stamkos on a goal-mouth sojourn and stopped a streaking Marchand tip, among many other feats), Canada got the result it deserved.
Alex Ovechkin was practically invisible thanks to Shea Weber and Marc-Edouard Vlasic and Canada's excellent defensive forwards made up for some shaky play by blueliners Bouwmeester and Alex Pietrangelo.
So now the Red and White Killing Machine moves on, to face either Sweden or Europe. Canada got a nice challenge from Russia, at least for part of the game, and now the gold is in sight. If everybody sticks to the plan, as per usual, Canada will be very hard to beat once in the final, let alone twice.
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